BELGIUM

Immigration and Emigration

Belgium presents an exception among the countries of Western Europe in that it has a greater immigration than emigration. The following table shows the growth of the two movements for the last four decades of the century:

Immigration is greatest from France, Germany, and the Netherlands, the three countries furnishing nearly 90 per cent. of the total. Curiously enough, emigration is distributed in about the same proportions among the same countries, only an insignificant proportion (about 2 per cent.) going to the United States; all of which shows that the character of the emigration movement in Belgium is quite different from that in the countries of Germany, Austria, Italy, and the United Kingdom, from which the bulk of the emigration to the United States is drawn. The emigration from Belgium is evidently of a temporary nature, the people going to and coming from the three neighboring countries mentioned as their interests require, but evidently not changing permanently their place of abode.

 AUSTRALIA

Mineral Resources

No other single factor has played so important a part in the industrial up building of Australia as her gold mines. Gold drew immigrants to the country; led to a more extensive exploration; established a home market, and led to civilization. Gold was officially reported as early as 1823, yet the gold fever struck the country only in 1851. New South Wales was the scene of the first activity, but within a year there was a rush to the Balarat district of Victoria, and seven years later to the Canoona district of Queensland. Western Australia was thought to be destitute of the precious metal, and it was not until the nineties that the rush to the Coolgardie districts (300 miles east of Perth) set in. Mining of any consequence in Tasmania began in 1870. South Australia, alone, has failed to contribute largely to the supply of gold.

Agriculture

The agricultural development of Australia has been governed by the remoteness of the continent from the rest of the civilized world, by the recent date of its settlement, and naturally by the peculiarities of its physical and climatic conditions. Its latitude and its contour are such that it is nowhere subject to extremes of cold, and is well adapted to the production of tropical and temperate zone products. With the passing of the gold fever of earlier years, the people are settling down to farming life and realizing its great possibilities.

The different State governments have sought to encourage the more rapid development of the crown-lands, and the State laws have been adapted to the nature and possibilities of the land and the varying desires and financial conditions of the settler. The terms for acquiring new lands include various kinds of conditional purchases, the installment plan being in vogue. Sometimes residence is exacted. Certain lands may be acquired by annual lease, but there is a growing tendency to lease in perpetuity. The States formerly assisted immigration, defraying in whole or part the expenses of transportation. At present, Queensland alone continues this plan. In this State farm laborers and female servants between the ages of 17 and 35 are free of transportation charges. Assistance is rendered also to other classes of immigrants.

Immigration

The discovery of gold has done more than any other factor to attract immigration from abroad and from one State to another. An illustration of this is the remarkable development of Victoria in the decade following 1850, and of Western Australia from 1891 to 1901. During the early part of the Nineteenth Century the convicts brought from Great Britain constituted a considerable part of the population. The assistance rendered to immigrants by the State Governments has been of importance, the States having borne the expenses in whole or in part of over 600,000 immigrants. The conditions for acquiring land have been most favorable (see Agriculture in this article). Foreign immigration greatly decreased, however, during the last decade of the century. Queensland contains the largest percentage of foreign born who constitute a third of the total population of the Commonwealth. The large majority of the foreign born come from the United Kingdom. Less than 4 per cent. of the population were born in lands not belonging to Great Britain.

Of these, the Germans and Chinese are the most numerous, each exceeding 40,000. There are in the Commonwealth only about 9,000 persons born in the United States. The Chinese are decreasing in numbers, the State laws now almost prohibiting their immigration; there are heavy fees exacted from landing immigrants, and ships are limited in the number they may bring, the number varying with the amount of the cargo. It has been found that the whites cannot so well endure the heat of Queensland in the cultivation of sugar cane as can the blacks, and this has led to the importation of Kanakas from the South Sea Islands.